Blake Gideon is leaving his alma mater to become the defensive coordinator at Georgia Tech, sources confirm to Dave Campbell’s Texas Football. The Leander product spent the last four seasons back at Texas as the safeties coach. He was a standout safety for the Longhorns from 2008-11 while starting in all 52 games of his career. 

Gideon never planned to become a coach. He quit football in 2013 to join the special forces, but a lingering shoulder injury forced a medical discharge during training. He landed at Florida with former Texas defensive coordinator Will Muschamp in 2014 as a quality control coach. He followed Muschamp to Auburn as a graduate assistant in 2015 before striking out on his own in 2016 at Western Carolina. He then had stops at Georgia State, Ole Miss, and Houston before his latest stint at Texas. 

Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian has enjoyed a rare amount of continuity with his staff since arriving on the Forty Acres ahead of the 2021 season. Gideon was part of that original staff he built for the Longhorns. Sarkisian and defensive coordinator Pete Kwiatkowski will now scour the college landscape for a replacement for Gideon as the safeties coach.